(−)-Hydroxycitric acid (abbreviated herein as HCA) is a naturally-occurring substance found chiefly in fruits of the species of Garcinia. HCA has been the subject of extensive investigations, yet in many areas has remained more “promising” than effective due to numerous issues regarding stability, bioavailability, the requirement for elevated dosages and the need for two or more dosing per day to avoid the even larger requirements for efficacy if ingested only as a bolus dose. Although HCA and several synthetic derivatives of citric acid have been investigated in regard to their ability to inhibit the production of fatty acids from carbohydrates, to suppress appetite, and to inhibit weight gain (Sullivan A C, Triscari J. Metabolic regulation as a control for lipid disorders. I. Influence of (−)-hydroxycitrrate on experimentally induced obesity in the rodent. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 1977; 30:767), the record is, at best, uneven with regard to efficacy in these and other areas.
Weight loss benefits were first ascribed to HCA, its salts and its lactone in U.S. Pat. No. 3,764,692 granted to John M. Lowenstein in 1973. The claimed mechanisms of action for HCA, most of which were originally put forth by researchers at the pharmaceutical firm of Hoffmann-La Roche, have been summarized in at least two United States Patents. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,626,849 these mechanisms are given as follows: “(−) HCA reduces the conversion of carbohydrate calories into fats. It does this by inhibiting the actions of ATP-citrate lyase, the enzyme that converts citrate into fatty acids and cholesterol in the primary pathway of fat synthesis in the body. The actions of (−) HCA increase the production and storage of glycogen (which is found in the liver, small intestine and muscles of mammals) while reducing both appetite and weight gain. (−) Hydroxycitric acid also causes calories to be burned in an energy cycle similar to thermogenesis . . . (−) HCA also increases the clearance of LDL cholesterol . . . .” U.S. Pat. No. 5,783,603 further argues that HCA serves to disinhibit the metabolic breakdown and oxidation of stored fat for fuel via its effects upon the compound malonyl CoA.
Literature on this compound has been reviewed by a number of authors, and new mechanisms of action and other findings continue to be published regularly. Technical and other data published over a period of more than five decades continues to support unequivocally the early findings by Roche researchers in the 1970s that the efficacy of a bolus dose is far below that of a much smaller amount of the compound given via two or more doses per day. Using an animal model measuring total weight gain and food consumption in rats administered trisodium hydroxycitrate orally for 30 days, it was established that the lowest effect dosage was 0.33 mmoles/kg body weight given twice daily for a total of 0.66 mmoles/kg leading to 62 percent of the weight gain of controls and to 87 percent of the food consumption of controls. It took 2.63 mmoles/kg to achieve this same degree reduction in weight gain (64 percent) and food consumption (83 percent). Lesser amounts given by bolus did not lead to significant reductions in weight gain in this model. (Sullivan, A. C., J. Triscari, J. G. Hamilton, O. N. Miller, and V. R. Wheatley. 1974. Effect of (−)-hydroxycitrate upon the accumulation of lipid in the rat: I. Lipogenesis. Lipids 9:121-128.)
The Roche animal dosages should be put in perspective as the likely lowest efficacious human dose under similar conditions of less than 10% calories from fat in the diet. At 0.33 mmol HCA b.i.d., the human dosage is 208 mg×0.33×70 kg=4.8 grams of HCA per dose×2=9.6 grams HCA/day=16 grams of a 60% salt. Using the normal rat-to-human multiplier for calculating the small animal effect (Freireich E J, Gehan E A, Rall D P, Schmidt L H, Skipper H E. Quantitative comparison of toxicity of anticancer agents in mouse, rat, hamster, dog, monkey, and man. Cancer Chemother Rep. 1966 May; 50(4):219-44), an appropriate dose for humans would be closer to 9.6÷5=1.92 grams hydroxycitric acid content b.i.d. on an extremely low fat diet and assuming the material is supplied via a salt that is equivalent to pure trisodium hydroxycitrate in efficacy and is delivered without food effect on uptake, which has been shown to reduce the bioavailability of the potassium-calcium salt in humans to approximately 8 percent (Loe YC1, Bergeron N, Rodriguez N, Schwarz J M. Gas chromatography/mass spectrometry method to quantify blood hydroxycitrate concentration. Anal Biochem. 2001 May 1; 292(1):148-54). Inasmuch as humans seldom eat 10 percent fat diets except under conditions of food scarcity or medical restriction, the minimal dose for efficacy generally is higher, as indicated by the successes and failures of human trials.
Clinical trials examining HCA and weight loss have used dosages ranging from 1 gram to 2.8 grams HCA per day via two or three intakes. The 2.8 gram dosage more closely matches the animal-to-human extrapolation above and is the amount that has given the most consistently positive result in trials. (Onakpoya I, Hung S K, Perry R, Wider B, Ernst E. The Use of Garcinia Extract (Hydroxycitric Acid) as a Weight loss Supplement: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomised [sic] Clinical Trials. J Obes. 2011; 2011:509038.) Calcium-only HCA salts have not proven effective and comparative animal trials have demonstrated that potassium- and potassium-magnesium HCA salts are more active than potassium-calcium salts. (Louter-van de Haar J, Wielinga P Y, Scheurink A J, Nieuwenhuizen A G. Comparison of the effects of three different (−)-hydroxycitric acid preparations on food intake in rats. Nutr Metab (Lond). 2005 Sep. 13; 2:23.) (Clouatre D, Preuss H G. Potassium Magnesium Hydroxy-citrate at Physiologic Levels Influences Various Metabolic Parameters and Inflammation in Rats. Current Topics in Nu-traceutical Research 2008; 6: 201-210.) The initial studies of HCA all used a virtually pure trisodium salt. However, recent studies often have failed to indicate the form of HCA used. It should be noted in passing that neither the free acid form nor the lactone of HCA is suitable for chronic use for a number of reasons, e.g., the chelation of transition metals (such as zinc) from the body, throat irritation and other similar issues revealed in the literature on HCA.
Notably, few current authors address a major issue with HCA supplementation, to wit, that there can be a reverse effect, i.e., weight gain, on diets containing significant amounts of alcohol or fat. As discovered decades ago, “no hydroxycitrate inhibition of acetate or ethanol incorporation [into fatty acid synthesis] was observed” in experiments designed to examine this issue. (Brunengraber H, Lowenstein J M. Effect of (−)-hydroxycitrate on ethanol metabolism. FEBS Lett. 1973 Oct. 15; 36(2):130-2.) Very low calorie diets necessarily cause the body to rely upon fat stores for fuel. Although HCA has been shown to shift the body towards preferential metabolism of fat for fuel, there is a point at which dietary reliance on fats or alcohol, whether through food choices or dieting, negates the impact of HCA. This was demonstrated in Roche's pair feeding study in which animals artificially restricted in diet to the same number of calories as induced by HCA feeding actually lost slightly more weight than the HCA arms. (Sullivan, A. C., J. Triscari, J. G. Hamilton, O. N. Miller, and V. R. Wheatley. 1974. Effect of (−)-hydroxycitrate upon the accumulation of lipid in the rat: I. Lipogenesis. Lipids 9:121-128.) Similarly, in a large clinical trial in which both the active and the control arms were placed on high fiber, low calorie diets, both arms lost weight, but the control arm lost more. (Heymsfield SB1, Allison D B, Vasselli J R, Pietrobelli A, Greenfield D, Nunez C. Garcinia cambogia (hydroxycitric acid) as a potential antiobesity agent: a randomized controlled trial. JAMA. 1998 Nov. 11; 280(18):1596-600.) The tendency towards a reverse effect on high fat and/or high alcohol diets is a result of these diets making acetyl units available from beta-oxidation rather than from the export of citrate from the Citric Acid Cycle, which is the more common path under normal metabolism. Increasing the amount of HCA ingested and/or, and more successfully, using more active forms of HCA, reduces or eliminates the likelihood of a reverse effect under most conditions. This point is demonstrated in our U.S. Pat. No. 6,476,071, which shows that on a 30 percent fat diet and in line with the findings of Louter-van de Haar et al. cited above, a relatively pure potassium HCA salt led to a significant reduction in weight gain whereas the potassium-calcium HCA salt led to significant increase in weight gain relative to control. In other words, the potassium-calcium HCA salt suffered a reverse effect on a 30 percent fat diet, which for rodents is a high fat diet.
Dose compliance is yet another challenge. It is well established that compliance declines significantly as the required dose moves from once per day to multiple doses per day. The vast preponderance of studies have found that individuals are more compliant with once-daily compared with twice-daily or thrice-daily treatment regimens. (Saini SD1, Schoenfeld P, Kaulback K, Dubinsky M C. Effect of medication dosing frequency on adherence in chronic diseases. Am J Manag Care. 2009 Jun. 1; 15(6):e22-33.) One study states directly, mentioning most of the important parameters for consideration, “Reducing the number of daily doses through extended-release formulations or newer drugs has frequently been shown to provide the patient with better symptom control in a number of disease states. Overall improvements were seen in adherence, patient quality of life, patient satisfaction, and costs. However, results of some studies indicate that not all patients, medications, or diseases may be candidates for reduced dosing due to the potential effects on symptom control, incidence of adverse events, and overcompensation for missed doses.” (Richter A1, Anton S E, Koch P, Dennett S L. The impact of reducing dose frequency on health outcomes. Clin Ther. 2003 August; 25 (8):2307-35.)
The instant invention addresses the concerns raised above, which point to a significant need for an approach to HCA supplementation to reduce the number of daily doses to one bolus dose without an increase in the total dosage or adverse events, to improve uptake so that lower dosages can be employed, to lessen the time window required for uptake such that the known food effect found with HCA is reduced, and to mitigate the challenge of potential reverse effects.
At the time of this writing, HCA has been sold freely for approximately two and one half decades, yet the requirement for multiple doses per day for efficacy has not been overcome. The surprising finding of the instant invention is that there is a method by which the benefits of the multiple dose model can be achieved via a bolus dose without resorting to elevated levels of intake. Indeed, some benefits not otherwise reported can be achieved.